Real Estate Transactions

Discipline, Strength, Diversity

Schnader’s Real Estate Practice Group serves a wide range of entrepreneurial, institutional and public sector clients, including developers, lenders, property owners, investment bankers, brokers, contractors, landlords, tenants, asset managers, loan portfolio advisers, REITs and other investors. Its substantive and geographic breadth, composed of real estate lawyers who have recognized areas of real estate specialization, enable the group to meet the needs of an astonishingly diverse clientele throughout all of Schnader’s principal offices.

In recent years Schnader’s real estate lawyers have played leading roles in high-profile projects involving the construction, renovation, sale or refinancing of convention centers, sports arenas, waterfront developments, air hub distribution centers, shopping centers, mixed-use commercial facilities, alternative energy plants, waste disposal systems, troubled real estate ventures and military installations excessed by the government for redevelopment in the private sector.

Schnader’s lawyers have been at the vanguard of all the most important emerging areas of real estate practice, including construction for the telecommunications industry, multiuse and special service districts funded through joint public-private initiatives, conduit lending and tax increment financing. Schnader’s real estate lawyers have guided clients participating in these projects from concept development to final closing, providing both oversight for the long-term and nuts-and-bolts attention to the mechanics of steering real estate projects through the maze of government regulation.

Another distinguishing feature of Schnader’s real estate practice is that it long ago broke through from the traditional barriers that have bound large firms. Many of Schnader’s real estate lawyers litigate extensively in their discrete subspecialties, drawing liberally, when and as appropriate, from the personnel and resources of Schnader’s Litigation Services Department.

Lawyers joining the Real Estate Practice Group, particularly those just entering the profession or transitioning to real estate from a different substantive field, learn from many senior attorneys practicing in several of our offices, as our practice group chair works continuously to improve and expand upon the experiences and education of less senior lawyers.

Practice Team Approach

Schnader has vigorously embraced the practice group management model, which redirects critical resources for planning and practice development from distant administrative bodies and into the hands of the substantive practitioners. Schnader’s Real Estate Practice group has taken that model one step further, creating six separate substantive practice teams and granting to each the resources and authority needed to operate at the front lines. Those practice teams reflect six of Schnader’s areas of greatest substantive strength:

Our practice teams are poised to address client needs with both precision and depth, drawing upon the resources of Schnader’s seven principal offices located strategically throughout the country.

Our Diverse Clients

The range and the depth of our practice is perhaps best reflected in the diversity of our clients. We regularly represent major real estate clients including developers of industrial parks, offices and hotels, major universities, public sector agencies, owners, tenants, mortgage lenders, design professionals, title insurance companies, real estate investment trusts and contractors on a local and national scale. We also represent a broad range of domestic and international businesses whose worldwide activities include substantial real estate needs. We also represent start-up organizations and individual entrepreneurs in the early stages of growing their business, addressing such real estate needs as the development of build-to-suit facilities, the acquisition or leasing of buildings or office space and a variety of zoning and planning matters.

An Integrated Approach to Delivering Services

Many of Schnader’s real estate lawyers have had experience in both legal and business environments. A number of our attorneys have earned advanced degrees or licenses in real estate related disciplines, including architecture, engineering and title insurance. Schnader’s real estate lawyers who before joining Schnader had worked in the governmental arena draw still draw bountifully from experience, representing cities and other municipalities, drafting legislation and handling governmental proceedings.

Leadership in the Community

Schnader’s real estate attorneys have served in leadership positions in major bar and industry organizations including:

Our real estate lawyers also lecture frequently on real estate matters to other lawyers and to nonlegal professionals in the real estate field. Within recent years, we have participated in significant seminars and workshops on the Americans With Disabilities Act, new developments in zoning and real estate development law, and bankruptcy and foreclosure/collection matters involving real estate.

Contacts

The Higher Calling Of The Law Requires...

Inclusion. When Pennsylvania Attorney General William Schnader left politics and sought to return to private practice in Philadelphia, he discovered that no major Philadelphia law firms would hire his protégé, Bernard Segal, a Jewish attorney. In response, in 1935, William Schnader, Bernard Segal and Francis Lewis formed a new law firm, Schnader & Lewis -- the first religiously integrated law firm in Philadelphia.

Innovation. Because Schnader was religiously integrated from its founding, many local clients in the Philadelphia area would not retain the firm in the 1930s and 1940s. Accordingly, the firm sought to represent larger, national companies.

Vision. Firm founder William Schnader was president of the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws, which drafted and developed the Uniform Commercial Code. He successfully campaigned for the Code's adoption in 49 states.

The pursuit of freedom. At the request of President Truman, firm founder Earl Harrison, as Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, toured displaced persons camps at the end of World War II and recommended to the President that displaced persons in Europe be permitted to resettle in Palestine. His report was a major factor that led to American support for the establishment of Israel.

The pursuit of justice. Firm founder Earl Harrison testified on behalf of an African-American student denied entry to the University of Texas School of Law because of his race. The case challenged the "separate but equal" doctrine, as applied to state law schools and laid the foundation for Brown v. Board of Education. The Supreme Court eventually overturned the lower courts' decisions and ordered the University of Texas to admit qualified black applicants.

Courage. Firm founder Bernard Segal convinced the Philadelphia bar to defend nine accused Communists pro bono. The defendants were convicted but their cases were thrown out on appeal. As a result, the Justice Department abandoned Smith Act prosecutions across the country.

The pursuit of justice. When George Wallace threatened to block integration of the University of Alabama, Schnader’s Bernard Segal drafted a statement in opposition. He and Jerome Shestack called lawyers all over the country requesting their support. The statement was published in the Birmingham News with 53 prominent lawyer signatories and provided support for President Kennedy's Executive Order federalizing the Alabama National Guard.

The pursuit of justice. In the wake of George Wallace's efforts to impede the integration of the University of Alabama, and at the urging of Schnader’s Bernard Segal, President Kennedy convened 244 lawyers at the White House to ask them to move the battle for civil rights and racial equality to the courts. The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law was born and Jerome Shestack became its full-time executive director while continuing to practice at Schnader.

Inclusion. Firm founder Bernard Segal was chair of the ABA’s Committee on the Federal Judiciary. He advocated the appointment of federal judges of all genders and races.

Inclusion. Firm founder Bernard Segal was the first Jewish person to serve as Chancellor of the Philadelphia Bar Association. He encouraged the bar into public service and expanded its racial horizons.

Inclusion. Schnader was one of the first major Philadelphia firms to hire a female attorney.

Diversity. Schnader was a founding member of the Philadelphia Diversity Law Group, which aims to increase the number of diverse attorneys in-house and in private practice.

Vision. Firm Chairman David Smith co-founded the Philadelphia Bar Foundation’s Board Observer Program with Norm Weinstein of Galfand Berger, LLP. The program provides young attorneys with the opportunity to serve on nonprofit boards, where they can develop the leadership skills necessary for board membership, and increase the diversity of nonprofit boards.

Inclusion. The firm appointed Albert Dandridge as Chief Diversity Officer and charged him with increasing and developing our bench of diverse attorneys.

Service. The firm adopted Caton Village (now closed), a halfway house for women in Philadelphia, where we provided free legal clinics and social and educational activities for its residents.

Service. Schnader lawyers regularly represent undocumented children who were abused or abandoned by their parents. We help these children obtain guardians, stop removal proceedings, and begin the path to citizenship.

Service. As U.S. veterans waited an average of four years for a ruling on the denial of their disability benefits, Schnader attorneys led a campaign advocating for a solution to address the backlog.

The pursuit of justice. Schnader attorneys represented Guantanamo Bay detainees, advocating for fair treatment and due process against a byzantine legal landscape.

Service. With a nonprofit partner, Schnader attorneys and staff designed and taught a pilot life skills seminar for young adults aging out of the foster care system. The program included lessons on securing vital documents, opening a bank account, looking for jobs and going to an interview.

Service. Schnader attorneys help middle school students in Pittsburgh set up a youth court, prepare for mock trials and draft a bill of rights for their school. The students learn about Constitutional law, advocacy and restorative justice from participating in these programs.

Service. Bernard Segal, a founder of the firm, believed that Schnader's hallmark is its "dedication to the higher calling of the law," which he defined as "the lawyer's obligation to assume an active role in the pursuit of a just and ordered society, in helping to solve the emerging problems of social, economic and political importance, and to serve the public as his or her client, as she or he would serve a full-paying client."